Mary Morrell: Knowing we have enough is a place of peace and gratitude

While a blogger for a Catholic publisher, my task was to write on topics of concern for today’s parents. This sometimes proved to be a challenge because I am no longer raising children in today’s culture and am sometimes at odds with my own children about how to raise grandchildren.

But I have found there are some issues that are “evergreen” and continue to be issues of concern even for grown-ups. One of these, which stands in stark relationship to our ability for gratitude, is the concept of “enough” – an experience that lives somewhere between deprivation and abundance.

“Enough” is a place of satisfaction, happiness, and peace of mind. It doesn’t mean we are at a place of no struggle; it just means we have what we need if not everything we want. The challenge for parents is to help children move into adulthood knowing the difference.

Whether it is how much money we make, things we buy, time we waste or time we work, how much we consume or how much of our lives are spent in anger, complaints or judging others, we need to develop our internal voice to say, “That’s enough.”

Having parents who grew up during the Great Depression was a blessing for me. As adults, they were satisfied with their modest means and belongings, and loved the humble home I grew up in. The values I learned from them, to be happy with a simple life, to be grateful for what I had, to learn to make do, and to hold on to my faith, were essential for me as my husband and I raised six children and often did not have everything we needed, particularly enough money to pay all the bills.

When one of my young sons, at the dinner table where there was more than enough to go around, asked if we were poor, it opened a door for a conversation on what it means to know poverty.

Within the week, some generous parishioners left a box of Thanksgiving fixings, including the turkey, on our front porch. They obviously knew a family with so many children would appreciate the help, which we did, but I knew there were families who needed it more.

I called around until I found a church unable to help all the families on their Thanksgiving list. With an address in hand, and my youngest sons in the car, we pulled up in front of the house after dusk.

The porch where we were supposed to leave the box was barely visible from overgrown shrubs. There were holes in the roof and several windows were boarded up with plywood. It was a house we saw weekly on our trip to the supermarket but never imagined anyone actually lived there. It didn’t look safe. A child’s bike rested against a broken railing.

I walked in front of my sons, who carried the box and a few bags of extras we had filled ourselves and tried to quietly open the porch screen door. Thankfully, we were able to make the delivery clandestinely so as not to embarrass the receivers.

When we got back to the car, the boys were silent. Even the youngest of us need time to process a new understanding of something. As we drove home, I asked my son if he thought we were poor. He didn’t answer; he just shook his head no. The youngest was crying. I asked why. “There were no toys in the box. They need toys,” he said.

While we may sometimes envision the poor as being desperately unhappy, those who suffer material poverty are often those who are most joyful, grateful, generous and faithful, and cannot be counted among those of us who suffer from the many other forms of poverty – poverty of hope, of faith, of joy, of compassion, of generosity, of understanding, of gratitude.

In one of his messages for World Day of the Poor, Pope Francis gives us a meaningful reflection for a New Year: “Christian discipleship entails deciding not to accumulate earthly treasures, which give the illusion of a security that is actually fragile and fleeting. It requires a willingness to be set free from all that holds us back from achieving true happiness and bliss, in order to recognize what is lasting, what cannot be destroyed by anyone or anything.”

Mary Morrell is editor-in-chief The Catholic Spirit, the Metuchen Diocesan publication.